Page 45

K ez lands us in Tiv thirty minutes later.

After we’ve circled ‘round and ‘round the motives for everyone and their fucking clone to want to kill her. And gotten no closer to identifying anyone other than Jaxon.

I let her handle the landing. With the ground berths still closed in the aftermath of our crash, we dock at the tether, two klicks away from the city.

Tether landings are not overly technical.

And it’s good practice for Kez, who still struggles a little with landings. She does a fine job with this one.

Once we’re hooked into our berth, I flip the display over to a local feed. Pick up our messages. The first one is from Acker, asking us to plex him as soon as we land.

I stare at the message for a moment. Innocuous black Uni characters against the viewie’s background of sky and clouds. But they feel ominous. Why the change of plans? He and Tee were supposed to meet us. I expected them to be waiting at the tether.

With a sigh, I tap the interface to return the call.

Acker’s face immediately appears in the pane. “I have a pointy problem. ”

My neck and shoulders unknot. Hearing that he’s got a problem he can’t deal with on his own should make me tense. Instead, I relax. Pointy problems I can deal with. Betrayal from the only man I’ve liked well enough to call brother in a decade? That would fucking sting. “Whaddo you need?” I ask.

“You, and Lightfoot, if you will come. I need you in the Deeps. With everything you have. I know your questions for Java are urgent, but this is a problem that will not wait.”

I nod. Maybe this is a ruse. Maybe it’s a trap. But my gut says Acker’s in trouble. And you never say no to a brother in trouble. “On the way,” I tell him.

“I will meet you at the tether exit. The streets are not safe for either of us.”

“See you in ten.”

Kez, attuned to me in every way, is already tapping commands into the ship interface.

Plexing our change of plans back to base, reconfiguring the ship for an extended stay at the tether, and paying the berthing fee.

While she does, I climb out of my chair and head towards the Infinity’s storage holds.

There are five of them, but the smallest hold’s my destination.

At the moment, it looks like just another empty hold – gridded floor, empty mag-brackets set into the plain walls – and that’s all anyone would see on a scan.

When I give the ship a series of commands, panels in the ceiling fold back.

A double accordion drops slowly to the floor.

When the panels reach the floor, they rotate into racks and lock, revealing my own personal armory.

I take a pair of bags off the bottom rack and load them.

Acker said to bring everything I’ve got; I take that literally.

Body armor. Pulse grenades. PBEx. White phos smoke grenades.

EMP bombs. Two portable surveillance scanners.

A handful of tinglers. A plasma cannon which I liberated and recharged.

If I’d known the fucking thing wasn’t loaded when Ma Quack leveled it at me, I’da been nicer to her.

And a shitload of knives, most of which I’ve made myself.

A pair of katanas don’t go in the bags. They go across my back in a harness that lets me draw them over my shoulders.

Any tether security guard stupid enough to question me gets to meet them, up close and personal.

Kez joins me while I’m still loading up. She helps me clear the racks and shoulders one of the bags after I seal it closed. “Do you think it’s the Ojos?”

“That’d be my guess.” But I’m reserving judgment until I’m face to face with Acker. Could be a trap, in which case the Ojos are the least of his fucking worries.

She takes my hand and together we walk back through the cargo holds and exit through the ship’s proboscis, a flexible plaz tube that connects the ship with the tether’s funnel.

Exiting through the proboscis circumvents the passenger debarkation lounge, and that layer of tether security.

I got no illusions we’ll get out of the port without bumping into some sort of security, but it’ll be crew security, which is often more relaxed than security for the walking cargo.

When we reach the airlock at the bottom of the proboscis, we find it locked, red lights blinking around the circular portal.

Looks like the funnel grav-lift is busy.

Probably pressed into service moving cargo down the tether, since the ground berths are still closed.

We wait side-by-side, and I slant a glance at Kez.

Still wearing her genSkin pants and steel-toed boots.

Baby blues shadowed and set deep in their rings of khol.

Arms wrapped from wrists to elbow in genSkin and the shiny threads that are her weapon of choice.

Carrying half my arsenal over her shoulder.

“What kinda message you sendin’ now, kitten? ”

“Stop fucking hunting me.” Kez adjusts the bag. “What kind of message are you sending? Between that—” She nods at my Biosteel vest, which is unquestionably body armor. “—and your swords .”

I shrug. “Don’t want the rats to think I’ve gone soft.”

“Yeah.” She snorts. “You’re good.”

“Until we’re sure what’s what, kitten, you don’t turn your back on any of them.”

Kez’s grin tightens into a frown. “But Acker said?— ”

“I heard, and I believe him. That’s why we’re goin’. But a hundred CeeBees is still a big number.”

Kez squares her shoulders and stares at her boots. She’s silent for a moment and I let her think. Listen to the howl of the wind, the creak of the huge tether just beyond the airlock, and the faint drip of water somewhere, which I hope is off the tether rather than something dripping on our ship.

“Snow,” she begins, and I nod at her, acknowledging her careful use of my pseudonym.

We’re alone at the moment, on our own ship.

But the lift could arrive at any second, and someone could be scanning us.

The proboscis isn’t as heavily shielded as the rest of the ship, and Kez knows that.

“Is this how it’s been for you? Suspecting everyone? ”

“Pretty much.”

“What’d you think that first time I walked up to you? Did you think I wanted ... what did you think?”

“Thought I wanted to fuck you.”

She snorts. “Other than that.”

“Yeah, kitten, I was suspicious.”

“You didn’t show it.” She looks down, scuffs her boot along the proboscis’s polymousse flooring. “I just wanted to know you.”

“I got that.” That’s why she’s my one-in-a-billion.

“Maybe Acker’s the same way.”

“He’s shit outta luck if he is.”

She looks up at me quizzically. “Why? Have you changed your mind about him?”

“No, I never wanted to fuck him.”

Kez gapes at me, then begins to laugh. At that moment, the airlock control blinks green. I give it a tap and the airlock slides open with a soft swush to counterpoint Kez’s laughter.

The huge grav-lift pod drops us nine thousand meters in less than a minute.

My ears pop with the change of pressure as we reach the ground.

Other than the pressure-change, there’s no sense of how fast we’ve travelled in the spacious capsule.

The Clouds are the home of Kuseros’s elite.

They get the best of everything: food, water, tech.

There’s something to be said for living out here.

Still, Nock is my city, mine and Kez’s. I’d miss it.

But maybe it’s time to buy ourselves a beach house.

Yawning to pop her ears, Kez steps out of the pod airlock. I follow a step behind her, and we come face-to-face with the tether security I figured we’d bump up against eventually.

My neck tightens when the blue and yellow uniformed guard’s eyes flick to the sword hilts over my shoulders.

His eyes track back to mine and I see that they’re green and slitted vertically like a cat’s.

I tilt my head so the overhead lights flare on the tapetum lucidum in my own eyes.

It’s my only obvious modification, besides my size, which ain’t all that unusual on a garden world like Kuseros.

The guard nods. “Acker’s waiting for you.” He gestures to a gridded gray slider to his right. Away from the bright lights and plush passenger spaces that I can see behind him.

I hold out my hand. “What’s your name?”

“Tonnon.” He shakes and I feel the roughness of his palms. His modifications don’t stop at his eyes.

“Snow,” I tell him.

“I know who you are. You been making a splash here on the Clouds. You and Lightfoot.” He nods at Kez, who has edged a step away. “You keep your heads down,” Tonnon continues. “And watch out for gators.”

Gators. Great.

“Thanks for the warning.” I take Kez’s hand and pull her after me as I follow Tonnon’s finger.

Through the grey, gridded door, there’s a low-lit corridor, mostly filled by the furred, muscular bulk of two waiting rat-men.

Acker’s eyes flash in the gloom. He holds up his paw, puts a long claw to his lips, then beckons us after him.

Captain Match, keeping watch down the corridor, moves off without looking at us.

Acker follows Match; I follow Acker; Kez follows me, holding my hand.

Quite the parade.

I like this so fucking little that I pause to draw a kukri out of my boot. Kez meets my eyes as I do it. She unwinds a length of monofilament from her left bracer and carries it loose in her free hand when we start off after the rats again.

The utilitarian corridor turns north, turns again and just after the second turn, Match freezes. We all stop behind him and I listen. Right on the edge of my hearing, there’s a sound. Soft and deep, like swallowing with your ears blocked.

“Match,” Acker whispers.

“Nag-Morrd still flooded,” Match responds. He looks back over his shoulder at Acker and I see that the fur on the right side of his face and neck has been burned away, leaving grizzled stubble striped with pink newskin. “Um take the Shutsoga.”